CNN "CNN Newsroom" - Transcript: "Interview with Rep. John Garamendi"
Interview
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MARQUARDT: Right. And officials -- officials from Germany and Britain were also briefed, but as you say, Jim, no Iranians met with any Americans.
Jim Bittermann, staying up late for us in Biarritz in France. Thanks very much.
Now joining us is Democratic Congressman John Garamendi from California. He sits on the House Armed Services Committee.
Congressman, thanks so much for joining us tonight.
REP. JOHN GARAMENDI (D-CA): Good to be with you.
MARQUARDT: I want to start with this last-minute invitation that we're just talking about with Jim Bittermann by the French President Macron to Iran's foreign minister over there at the G7 summit. The White House had been aware. We understand that they learned later. They have called it a curveball. They did not know Iranians met with anybody from the American delegation. But the Europeans, as we saw and others, are clearly interested in keeping Iran in the fold. And more than anything, keeping the Iran nuclear deal, the JCPOA going.
But what does this say that Iran would fly to the G7, meet with France? What does it say about how isolated the U.S. is on the issue of Iran?
GARAMENDI: Well, you just said it so very, very well. When the president unilaterally pulled out of the joint JCPOA, that was the nuclear deal with Iran, he left our allies, the Europeans, British, French, Germans, the Russians, and the Chinese, he left them hanging out there. He went off all by himself and pulled America out.
Now those other countries have done their very best to try to keep the deal together because in their view, and in mine, the deal actually was preventing Iran from moving forward with its nuclear bomb program. Now Iran has plenty of other problems. They clearly have terrorist operations in the area. They are clearly a bad set of actors. Nevertheless, the Europeans sent a very clear message or at least the French here sent a very clear message to the president that he is on his own here and that the Europeans, together with the Russians and the Chinese, are going to try to keep the JCPOA intact, in place.
Whether the president is going to be successful with his maximum pressure campaign, it appears rather doubtful right now.
MARQUARDT: Another area, Congressman, that the U.S. seems to be on its own, the Trump administration is the question of bringing Russia back into the G8. This year, as we have noted, is a G7 summit. Russia was kicked out after they invaded and annexed Crimea. So what do you make of the president's call to readmit Russia and recreate it as a G8?
GARAMENDI: Well, first of all, the policy question, it is just really a real bad policy. No doubt Russia is a bad actor. Not only did they annex -- invade and annex Crimea using their little green man and then the regular military, they also used their little green men in an invasion of eastern Ukraine, a fight that is still going on. It's a war going on in that area, a very low-level right now.
Now the Europeans were correctly very, very concerned that Russia was on the move to put pressure on the Eastern European countries that could easily have invaded, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. So, the United States pushed back. We have done a lot in that area. We have increased troop -- our own troops. We have also moved to strengthen NATO in the area. A little later next month, I'll be going there with my fellow Armed Services Committee members to strengthen the alliance and to make sure that we have sufficient resources in place in Eastern Europe to make it very clear to the Russians, no, you cannot do that, yes, you must leave Ukraine.
Until those things are done, then we should never allow Russia back into the G7. The president is just plain wrong here. Now that's on the policy side. On the political side, what's going on here with President Trump and Putin? What is this relationship? What does Putin have over this president that causes this president to do some really bad policy decisions?
[20:20:02] MARQUARDT: All right. Congressman John Garamendi, we've got to leave it there. Thanks so much for speaking with me tonight.
GARAMENDI: Good to be with you. Thank you.
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